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ID	Title	Author	Corrected Date of Publication (TCP Date of Publication)	STC	Words	Pages
A14095	A discovery of D. Iacksons vanitie. Or A perspective glasse, wherby the admirers of D. Iacksons profound discourses, may see the vanitie and weaknesse of them, in sundry passages, and especially so farre as they tende to the undermining of the doctrine hitherto received. Written by William Twisse, Doctor of Divinitie, as they say, from whom the copie came to the presse	Twisse, William, 1578?-1646.	1631 (1631)	STC 24402; ESTC S118777	563,516	728

witt Gabriel Biel after Occam Nowe what will you say if they resolve it for the negative and so bothe wayes namely both negatively and affirmatively which you say they holde for a point irresoluble And indeede they resolve it bothe wayes for I have not tolde you all They interpose a caution the caution is this Si possibilie esset locus indivisibilis Whence you may easily guesse what their meaninge is to witt that indeede a punctuall and indivisible place cannot be existent and consequently neyther can an Angell be defined therin or coasist therto there is the resolution negative But in case such a punctuall place were possible then an Angell might coasist therto there have you the resolution affirmative in both opposite to this assertion of yours But who they be you speake of that holde this point irresoluble you conceale And yet it may be some such there are For as Cicero sometimes sayde there was nothing so absurde but had bene delivered by some or other of Philosophers so the like may be verified of Schoolemen allso For amongst all kindes of humane writers there may be some vanities more or lesse and some thinke most amongst Schoolemen according to the censure passed upon them Ab hoc tempore Philosophia sacularis sacram Theologiam sua curiositate muliti saedari caepit From Angells you proceede to God and without scruple maynteyne that he is as properly in every Center as in every place and I confesse the reason here added why you may say so is very sounde seing we acknowledge him a like incomprehensibly and indivisibly in both For surely a man may say that which he dothe acknowledge but take no more along with you herein then are willing to accompany you upon good termes Now Occam and Biel propose certeyne termes and they are these si locus punctualis possibilis esset But if such a thing be not possible to say that God is therin is to say that God is in nothing and so you returne to your old course of amplifyinge the immensitie or indivisibilitie of the glorious essence of God that made us And wheras we are willing to acknowledge that God is in all thinges as conteyninge them I doe not finde that a point is of any conteynable nature As for example there is punctus lineam terminant now suppose God conteynes the line and conteynes not the point shall the line herupon be without an ende I professe I cannot finde any other thinge in the notion of such a point but negatio ulteriorie tendentiae and what neede hathe this of the divine power to conteyne it And surely the point which continueth a line is nothing more then the center of the earthe and of that you professe in the next chapter and second section that it is a matter of nothing The manner of Gods indivisibility we conceave say you by his coexistence to a Center his incomprehensiblenes by his coexistence to all spaces imaginable as much as to say The indivisibility and incomprehensiblenes of God is best conceaved when we conceave his coexistence to such thinges as are founde only in imagination or to thinges that are but have no realitie in them Now if God be all in all and all in every part is he not better conceaved by comparison with the soule of man which is made after the image of God then by comparison to a base Center or thinges in imagination only especially seing Imaginatio non transcendit continuum If God were more in a great place then in a lesse then it would followe that an Asses head shoulde participate the essentiall presence of the deitie I speake in your owne instance and phrase in greater measure then a mans heart dothe And doe not you affect some popular applause in this discourse of yours the vulgar sort being apt to conceave the contrary namely that a mans heart participates the essentiall presence of the deitie in greater measure then an Asses head and by the same reason they may conceave that a mans head participates the essentiall presence of the deitie in greater measure then an asses heart which yet is as contrary to your assertion as to the truthe But it is manifest herby more then enoughe that your care is not so much for the investigation of truthe as to give satisfaction unto vulgar conceyte 9. That Gods immensitie or magnitude is not like magnitude corporall as being without all extension of parts as there is no doubt so wee neede no great paynes to satisfie reason how this may be especially to every Scholar that knowes but that receaved Axiome even amongst naturalists concerning the soule namely that she is all in all and all in every part not only in the least childe newe borne but in the greatest Anakim that ever was which in my opinion gives farre better satisfaction then by multiplyinge bare woordes as in sayinge God is unitie it selfe infinity it selfe immensitie it selfe perfection it selfe power it selfe which serve neyther for proofe nor for illustration But if we goe about to satisfie imagination we shall never come to an ende For Imagination transcends not that which is continuall and hathe extension of parts and all your courses of illustration hitherunto have inclined this way You speake in your owne phrase when you say that all these before mentioned to witt unitie infinitie immensity perfection power are branches of quantitie wheras we have more just cause to professe that no quantitie is to be found in God no more then materiall constitution is to be found in him We make bolde to attribute unto God quantitatem virtutis quantitie of vertue and perfection but every scholar should knowe that Analogum per se positum stat pro famesiori significato And yet to speake more properby the quantity of God which we call quantitatem virtutis and the quantity of bodies which we call quantitatem motis quantitie of extension have no proportion at all betweene them but the terme of quantitie attributed to both is merely equivocall It is true that if God were not nothing could be for as much as all other thinges have their being from him But it is a very incongruous course in my judgement which you take by multiplyinge of quantitie materiall to guesse of Gods immensitie And yet you should have observed a better decorum in your phrase if insteede of multiplication you had putin the woord amplification For immensitie is rather magnitude infinite then multitude I cannot away with that which you subjoine that imaginary infinity of succession or extension shoulde be a beame of that stable infinitenes which God possessethe Hertofore you called it a shadowe nowe a beame And is this a proper course to runne out to the imagination of thinges impossible to represent God by For wherto tendeth this but to conceave him infinite first by way of extension which is quite contrary to spirituall perfection and secondly after such a manner as is utterly impossible to be Yet

prepare him so much as the knowledge of Grammar yet he shall not be proud of it neyther Vasquius further telleth us that Aegidius was of opinion that this truthe that there is a God is a truthe knowne of it selfe And albeit Thomas Aquinas denyethe it to be a truthe per se notam quoad nos Yet in it selfe he professethe that it is per se nota for as much as the predicate is included in the very nature of the subject And to my judgement it seemes allso to be so quoad nos if it be duly consid●red pondered what we understand by God to witt the most perfect nature of all others Nowe howe is it possible that that which is more p●rfect then all others shoulde not have beinge And every man knowes that that which hathe beinge is more perfect then that which neyther hathe nor can have beinge such as is the nature of God if it have no beinge For according to the Proverbe a live Dogge is better then a dead Lyon In the next place you inquire wherunto you shall liken him This indeede was the second thinge you proposed to be inquired into But in what congruitie to a Philosophicall or Theological discourse I leave it to others to examine I will be content to summe up the accoumpt of what you deliver rather then to argue the unseasonablenes of such a discourse Thoughe nothing can exactly resemble him yet som● thinge you say can better notify howe farre he is beyond all resemblance then others But truly what you meane herby is a mystery unto me I shoulde rather thinke the incomprehensible nature of God is not to be manifested by way of resemblance drawne from inferior thinges That he is the cause of all thinges dothe better represent the nature of God then the resemblance of him to any thinge especially consideringe what cause he is to witt an ●fficient cause of all thinges and that not univocall but equivocall consequently such as comprehendes all thinges eminently but in perfection without comparison beyond them For comparison hathe place only betweene things agreeinge in kinde or in proportion But God and his creatures agree in neyther This I confesse may drawe to admiration As the Philosopher who beinge demaunded what God was required three dayes libertie to put in his answeare and at three dayes ende required three more at the ende of these three dayes more giving this reason of his reiterated demurring upon the matter because the more he gave himselfe to th● contemplation of the nature of God the farther he found● himselfe of from comprehendinge it but wheras you adde that such admiration will more more enlarge our longinge after his presence I doe no way like eyther your collection or the phrase wherby you expresse it For as for the presence of God of the very apprehension therof we are not capable in this World but by faithe Neyther can any naturall admiration arising from naturall inquisition after the nature of God consideration of the fruiteles issue therof drawe men to a longing after that presence of God which they knowe not Bothe the knowledge of the presence of God and a longinge desire after it I take to be a woorke of speciall grace and not any woorke of nature upon the power wherof I finde you doa●e too much in all your writings Painters you say can more exactly expresse the outward lineaments of thinges then we their natures Painters expressions are in colours our expressions are not so but rather in woordes And what a wilde comparison is it to compare thinges so heterogeneall in exactnes But though the expression of the one fayle in exactnes in comparison of the other yet the delight taken therin you say needes not And thus you plot to make the love of God a woorke of nature wherunto the naturall conceptions of him though nothing exact by meanes of the creature may leade us These conceptions of yours are in my judgement as farre from truthe as from pietie The frequent ebbes flowings of Euripus may cast a Philosopher into admiration not comprehending the reason of it yet bringe him nothing the more in love with it Angells are of very glorious natures in a manner quite out of the reach of our reason bothe touching their being in place their motion their understandinge the communicatinge of their thoughts exercising of their power yet all this bringeth us never a whit the more in love with them Impressions of love are wrought only by the apprehension of goodnes in the object which alone makes thinges amiable as a beautifull picture affecteth the sense with pleasure and delight But nowe I finde that from the impression of love you slip I knowe not howe to the impression of truthe this I confesse delightethe some mindes of purer metall as Aristotle speakes of the delight that a Man takes in the demonstration wherby it is prooved that the Diameter in a squate hathe no common dimension with the sides of it or that a triangle hathe three angles equall to two right Especially if the conclusion be rare long sought after but not founde as the squaring of a circle receaved as knowable in Aristotles dayes thoughe not knowne till of late as Pancirolla writes Salmuly in his commentaries upon him about 30. yeares before that time Yet some speculations may be as vayne as curious as to proove that two Men in the World there are that have iust so many hayres on their head one as another But to make a rayne bowe in the ayre by ocular demonstration proove the truthe of that which reason concludes namely that as often as a raynbowe appeares in the cloudes though it seeme but one yet indeede there are as many as there are Men that beholde it because it discoverethe a secret of nature very curious and nothing vayne For it is the glory of God to hide a thinge and it is the glory of a Kinge to finde it out And seeinge God hathe set the World in Mans heart thoughe a Man cannot finde out the woorke that God hath wrought from the beginninge to the ende yet it is good to be doinge to discover as much as we can especially such as have a calling herunto But to proceede you put your Reader in hope of great matters by your perfourmances namely to have a sight of some scattered rayes of a glorious light which Saints have in blessednes and to this purpose to elevate us to a certeyne Horizon whose edges and skirts shall discover this Thus you phrasify the matter gloriously prosecute your allegory in allusion to the brightnes that appeares in our Horizon after the Sunne set But surely that Sunne did never yet rise upon us and when it dothe surely it shall never sett And I much doubt least the glory of your phrases proove to be all the glory we are like to be acquainted with before we part Hence you proceede to a

may attribute it unto God But we like plaine fellowes love to speake plainlie and to call a spade a spade And in the like language we deny that God is after time to come and prove it thus To be in duration after any thing is to be while that other thing is past or at least the first ex●stence of it but God in this sence cannot be sayd to be after time to come because time to come is neither yet past nor yet existent Yet at length when divinations will not serve your turne you thinke to have gotten a text of Scripture for it Gods duration you say is Yesterday to day to morrowe and the same for ever It is well you did not quote Scripture least so your penne might have bene censured as Corruptor stilus for putting into the text to morrowe and that in small letters suitable with the former Perhaps you may say why may he not be as well sayd to be to morrowe as to be Yesterday I grant the proportion of truth in both but where doe you find it to be sayd of God that He is yesterday Take heed of adulter sensus which may be as bad as Corruptor stilus Not in the Hebrewes where it is onely sayd that Christ is the same yesterday and to day and for ever Not that he is Yesterday nor that he is To morrow but rather to the contrary thus He was he is and he is to come But still the same in opposition to alteration more wayes then you have expressed nor to alteration onely but to all possibilitie of alteration For he is of necessary being T is false to say that In his duration all thinges are It beeing neither true formally as it is manifest for time is no part of eternity nor eminently For it is nor Gods eternity that produceth things or maintayneth the duration of things but the will of God armed with power and wisedom to doe every thing At first sight I thought to have made no exception against the last sentence but upon second thoughts two members of the three seeme to be as faultie as any For things future have no being at all in esse reali as touching reall being they are in esse cognito and esse volito knowne by God and decreed to come to passe in due time So likewise things past have no being at all only they are knowne of and were decreed by God to be in such a time as now is past And how can they be sayd to be in God Not formally as is manifest nor eminently for he cannot produce things past For that were to make them not to be past Yet you end in a truth that Thinges present cannot subsist without him I would you had both begun and continued so Yet this you corrupt with a needlsse amplification That presence cannot subsist without him which being but a relation requires no distinct operation to susteyne it distinct from that which susteyneth the foundation In the end of the fifth Section you promised to intimate a certaine point of high perfection in God consisting in the reservation of his libertie but since that time we never heard of it more CHAP. IX Of Divine Immutability IN the first place you tell us that some Schoolemen mould immutability in the same conceit with eternity and that others make that the off-spring of this but you conceale your Authors I see no reason for either but manifest reason I have against the first For if the conceit of eternity were one and the same with the conceit of immutability then no man could conceive a thing to bee eternall but forthwith he must conceive it to be immutable But this is most untrue For Aristotle conceived the heavens and elements to be eternall both waies without beginning and without end yet did not conceive them to be immutable for as much as hee acknowledged them to be all under motion and the elements also as touching their parts subject to corruption Plato though he maintained the world to have had a beginning yet hee acknowledged it to be eternall one way that is without end yet did not conceive it to be immutable The first matter was generally held to be eternall both wayes yet none maintained it to be immutable And no marvell For mutation comprehends all kinde of motion and consequently immutability excludes all possibility of motion but eternity signifieth only continuance for ever Now like as continuance for seven yeares or an hundred yeares c. doth not require that the same thing should bee without all change for seven yeares or an hundred yeares c. much lesse doth it include the notion of immutability for such a space of yeares in the conceit thereof so neither doth continuance for ever include the notion of being without all change for ever in the conceit thereof Adam was made immortall and so had continued if he had not sinned yet should he not have been free from all change The Angels are eternall that is such as shall continue for ever and so were made yet neither are they now nor were they made immutable Indeed there are divers kindes of motions some are in qualitie called alterations some in quantitie called augmentation and diminution some in place called locall motion some in substance as generation and corruption Immutability in this last kinde commeth nearest to the conceit of eternity yet there is a difference For eternity signifieth onely an everlasting continuance which may be joyned with a possibility of not-continuance as in Angels and the soules of men and our bodies also in the world to come but immutability cannot bee joyned with such a possibility therefore the conceit of eternity and the conceit of immutabilitie are much different And for the same reason immutability cannot be the off-spring of eternity rather eternity is the off-spring of immutability I thinke both immediately flow from the manner of his being which is necessarie The like judgement may be made of that you avouch in the next place to wit That the true explication of the former containes the truth of this If by the former you meane eternity as I thinke you doe though some while I referred it to your discourse immediately preceding of Gods infinite wisedome which you chiefly place in foreknowing all things which is a good reason of the unchangeable nature of his will In my judgement immutability rather confirmes eternity then eternity confirmes immutabilitie and the knowledge of Gods eternity is the off-spring of the knowledge of his immutability rather then on the contrary and that for the reasons before given to wit because immutability inferres eternity eternity doth not inferre immutability 2. That God is unchangeable I nothing doubt but in my judgement you doe not well to prove it from the infinitenesse of his essence First because this consequent carryeth no evidence with it That nothing can bee added to that which is infinite carryeth some evidence but that nothing can be diminished from it

infinite Now of Gods infinite will I never heard before his power we say is infinite because hee can doe every thing that is possible to bee done his knowledge is infinite because hee knowes all things that may bee knowne but God doth not will all things that may bee willed by him Nay his power receives limitation and restriction by his will as touching the execution thereof for hee doth no more then what hee will Likewise wee say Gods love is infinite in the way of extention for it neither had beginning neither shall it have end But such is not Gods love towards them that perish for it ceaseth by your doctrine when the measure of their iniquity is filled up but such as it is you say it layeth no necessity upon their wills A most ridiculous speech as much as to say it doth not make men repent necessarily whereas concerning them that perish it is apparant that it neither makes them repent necessarily nor contingently And as for the elect hee gives them repentance which he doth not to the reprobates as Austine long agoe professed Istorum neminem adducit Deus ad salubrem spiritualemque poenitentiam qua homo reconciliatur Deo in Christo sive illis ampliorem patientiam sive non imparem praebeat Nyither doe wee say that to whom God gives repentance he gives obedience he makes them to repent necessarily to obey necessarily but freely For it is manifest that grace takes not away the power of disobedience but onely prevents the act of disobedience and that not in all particulars neither for the children of God sinne too often And as for those which want this grace which God bestowes on his elect they have not onely liberty left them unto sinne but also this liberty turnes into wilfulnesse according to that of Austine Libertas sine gratia non est libertas sed contumacia Liberty without grace is not liberty but wilfulnesse But yet wee say upon supposition that God will give any man repentance and that at such a time that man shall repent at such a time and t is impossible hee should not repent yet in repenting hee shall repent freely and not necessarily Like as God ordaining Christs bones should not be broken upon this supposition it was impossible it should be otherwise albeit the soldiers abstained from breaking of his bones not necessarily but deliberately and freely It is true the Lord saith Open thy mouth wide and I will fill it but his people would not hearken unto his voice And now the question is onely as touching their obedience whether God did any otherwise will that then by commanding it in respect of those that perish wee say hee did onely command it in respect of such wee say hee did not resolve to give them repentance to give them obedience though he could have done this and doth doe this unto his elect making them to passe under the rod and bringing them under the bond of the covenant not onely seeing their wayes but healing them also healing their rebellions and subduing their iniquities and treading Satan under their feet opening their eies and bringing them out of darkenesse into light and from the power of Satan unto God quickning them when they were dead in trespasses and sinnes creating a new heart and renewing a right spirit within them Doe you but acknowledge this as you must unlesse you will renounce the Scriptures and wee will never quarrell with you for saying God doth all this contingently and not necessarily 2 The Apostles move a question to our Saviour concerning him that was borne blinde Ioh. 9. whether hee had sinned or his fathers that he was horne blinde this was in respect of judgement corporall you apply this to a judgement spirituall that judgement was positive to bee bereaved of sight which in course of nature is otherwise then onely permissive in suffering them to be such as hee found them That was spoken in respect of some not common but extraordinary sinne for though there bee sinne common unto all yet this judgement is not and therefore they might well thinke if sinne were the cause it must bee some extraordinary sinne but our Saviour signifieth that it befell him in the course of Gods providence not so much in respect of sinne as in respect of a certaine end whereto God had ordained it But I hope neither the Apostles nor any sober man would imagine that some extraordinary sinne was required unto this that God should leave men as hee findes them without bestowing some supernaturall grace upon them And in despight of sinne God doth afford this grace to many thousands for God hath mercy on whom he will like as on the other side in despight of mens civility and naturall morality whom hee will he hardeneth Yet to the question by you proposed at pleasure you make no answer but adde hereunto out of Ion. 2. 8. They that follow lying vanities forsake their owne mercies as if you had a minde to imply that there is something in man that makes a difference why some are suffered to walke in their owne waies some are not wherein you doe but corrupt the state of the question after your usuall manner For the question is not about the consequent of lying vanities or not observing them but about the observing of lying vanities it selfe or not observing them that is how cometh it to passe that some are suffered to goe on in the course of their lying vanities some are not but rather are taken off from those ungodly courses wherein they have beene brought up as many thousands were taken off thus in the Apostles daies wee say it is the meere good pleasure of God that puts this difference having mercy on some and hardning others you take another course as when you say in your familiar and soliloquiall meditations with God Never hadst thou given them up to their owne hearts lust to treasure up wrath against the day of wrath had they not despised the riches of thy bounty Here you mixe different courses of God together for when you talke of giving them over to their owne hearts lusts Which scripture applieth to Gods dealing with his own people Israel upon the despising of his grace offered them in his word but the rest as this also being accomodated unto the heathens you seeme to referre to the despising of the riches of Gods bounty declared to them in his workes for as for the riches of Gods bounty declared in his word the heathen were not pertakers of this untill the dayes of the Gospell and whereas by the phrase of speech used you seeme to have an eye to that of the Apostle Rom. 2 3. 4. the riches of Gods bounty in that place is specified onely to consist in patience and long-suffering And how did they refuse it but in refusing to repent For the bounty there mentioned is noted to be a bounty leading unto repentance So that in the issue your